Israeli Strike Kills Gaza Militant

The Israeli military killed a Palestinian militant in Gaza on Friday and seriously wounded another one in what it said was the thwarting of a rocket attack into southern Israel.

ETHAN BRONNER

JERUSALEM — The Israeli military killed a radical Palestinian militant in Gaza on Friday and seriously wounded another one in what it said was the thwarting of a rocket attack into southern Israel.

Palestinian medical authorities confirmed the strike. Witnesses said a group of militants was near the barrier separating Israel and Gaza and was hit by a missile dropped by an Israeli drone. Tank shells landed immediately afterward, they said.

The Israeli announcement said its air force had “targeted a terrorist squad that was identified moments before firing rockets at Israel from the northern Gaza Strip. A hit was confirmed, thwarting the rocket fire attempt. The aforementioned squad is responsible for the firing of rockets at Israel in the past number of days.”

About a dozen rockets have been fired at Israel from Gaza in the past week. None caused injury or damage.

Palestinian security forces said the men hit on Friday were Salafists, a broad term for Islamists inspired by Al Qaeda who are challenging the rule of Hamas in Gaza. They accuse Hamas of being both collaborationist with Israel and insufficiently pious.

Israeli military sources later identified the man killed as Muaman Abu-daf and called him a “senior operative in the global jihad terror movement,” accusing him of involvement in a number of rocket attacks on Israel as well as having placed explosive devices near the barrier with Gaza aimed at patrolling Israeli forces. They also said he had been involved in a thwarted terror attack on the Egyptian-Israeli border this week.

Hamas, though rejecting Israel’s existence, follows a more pragmatic Islamist approach than the Salafists do, and it has been trying to stop rocket fire into Israel by the more radical groups.

On Tuesday, Israeli forces killed another Salafist and wounded 11 others in two attacks on a motorcycle and private vehicle in northern Gaza.

Three years ago, Israel mounted a major invasion of Gaza that lasted three weeks and killed about 1,300 people. In recent days, Israeli military commanders have been quoted as saying that another such invasion might be necessary if rocket fire could not be contained.